Stagnation!

I am still knitting Orangina. It feels like forever! It's only been a couple weeks though. Having that information on Ravelry certainly is useful. I am about 1 inch from joining the front to the back and knitting the ribbing on the bottom.

I am going to participate in a Harry Potter knitting competition, based loosely on the Tri-wizard Tournament. I'm quite excited to see how it will work. It starts September 5.

There is also a dishcloth swap I joined that starts soon (I hope). It's a great concept. 12 of us knit 1 dishcloth a month and then each month one of us receives a dishcloth from the other 11 knitters. I imagine I will knit all 12 using the same pattern. I really like it. I've already knit 20 or 30 of them and I'm still not tired of the pattern yet.

Ravelry certainly has made my knitting life busy. I love how easy it is to find new patterns and yarns there. No matter what I'm thinking about doing there is someone else who has made it or is thinking about it. I can look at the item knit in different colors and different yarns. Some people put great notes up on their 'project' page, which can be really helpful. I wish I was better about putting notes up.

I made more bread today. This time I made a medium rye and english muffin. The rye needs to be darker but the recipe is tasty. The english muffin is really cheater bread - it was made in the bread machine. It is also quite tasty. Both recipes came from King Arthur Flour.

I found another dark rye recipe, that I plan to try next week, on another site. I've had good and bad luck with that site. So next week, if the test bake is a success I'll post a link to that.

And with any luck at all I'll have a new project to talk about.

And we have -

Bread, beautiful bread:
This bread recipe was developed to celebrate the North Dakota Centennial. It's quite tasty and I haven't made if for several years.

My Secret Swap 14 package:
Should have put up these pictures a long time ago - but life got busy. This yarn is lovely and I just can't decide what to make with it. There was also some really great chocolate but it didn't make it to picture time. We ate it long before there were pictures.

And new yarn:
This is the yarn I bought to make the Tempest Sweater. This is my incentive to focus on finishing Kelly's Orangina.

Now you'll have to excuse me while I go eat some of the bread - it smells delicious!

A long quiet week.

Last week's bread baking was full of fail. I'm going to give it another go tomorrow.

I have done some knitting this week, but nothing has been finished. I did finish the lace portion of the back of Kelly's Orangina and started the front. I have about 2 inches of the front started.

I also found another baby sock pattern to try. So far I just haven't been happy with the ones in my library and new patterns are ALWAYS a good option.

Cross your fingers that tomorrow's bread baking turns out a wee bit better than last week.

Today - not knitting

Today I am doing something not knitting - baking bread.

I threw together a sponge, opened the grain grinder, ground the grain (the mill works great - with a lot less dust flying out of it then the old one - best declutter I ever took off someone's hands) and now I'm waiting for this to raise:


I hope it turns out well. I haven't got my recipes here so I had to scour the intertubes. This is not a terribly pleasing experience - except for this - King Arthur Flour.

This site has a lovely recipe section. I know the catalog is fraught with peril but the website is worse! Totally delightful but give the bank card to the spouse (or someone else you trust) and send them out for about 6 hours, while you browse. I have about 6 recipes I'd like to try but we don't really need 18 loaves of bread in the house.

Lopi Love

Here is another sweater. I finished this one in the car (except for tucking the ends) in the car on the way to and from camping.

It's design 36 from Lopi 18. The yarn is Alafoss Lopi. It should be nice and warm this winter.

I found the pattern and the yarn for Kelly's Orangina and I cast that on this morning. I've finished three pattern sets (it's a four row pattern repeated for 15 inches). So far so good! With any luck she will get it sometime this fall - just in time to put it in the closet for NEXT summer.

Camping and knitting

It could happen.

Pattern is Raspberry Lemonade by Adrienne Fong, in Regia 4-fach (a grey and a multi). This was a great camping knit. The pattern was easy to remember and knit so the pattern could stay safe and dry.

Now we are home doing laundry. That could take the entire weekend.